


This must be fake

by PrinceofBadassery



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bucky is the new guy, Canon Disabled Character, Deaf Clint, Gen, M/M, Steve is the captain of the soccer team, amputee bucky, and everybody is a lot more popular than you'd think they are
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-02
Updated: 2014-11-20
Packaged: 2018-02-23 21:02:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2555573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrinceofBadassery/pseuds/PrinceofBadassery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky has to switch schools a month after the school year has already started. His first day goes as well as expected and the handsome blond who insists on being his friend only makes things more complicated. It sounds too good to be true when he suddenly ends up at the popular kids table. Bucky doesn't trust anyone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Part of my attempt to write 50.000 words worth of fanfiction for NaNoWriMo.

Every period basically followed the same rules. Introduction as the new guy, awkward staring from everybody around as he made his way to his seat. And then there was more staring from the people sitting behind him if he wasn’t lucky and scored a seat in the back, which had so far only happened in second period Trigonometry. Eventually the whispers would calm down, sometimes at warning of a teacher, sometimes on their own. Third period Physics hadn’t been too bad, but that was mostly because there was a very noisy kid in the second row who constantly talked and almost took over the class at some point. He had messy brown hair that looked for all that it was worth like it was intended that way and wore a Black Sabbath band shirt that probably had seen better days.

Bucky was glad that for once the attention was not on him and he could concentrate on the class. That was until somebody on his left poked him in the arm to get his attention. And of course they couldn’t have poked his shoulder, no it had to be his upper arm, where they had met the hard resistance of his prosthesis and promptly poked some more, going so far as to wrap a hand around his upper arm.

Bucky jerked his arm out of their grasp before glaring at them.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Woah dude, chill!” They turned out to be a guy who looked a little bit older than Bucky, probably a senior. The gray shirt he was wearing did nothing to conceal his muscle mass, his dark hair was cropped close to his head and his nose looked like it had been broken at some point. He looked like the star of one of the sports teams, football if Bucky had to guess.

“What’s up with your arm?” He laughed.

“Leave me alone.” He turned away again and tried to focus on writing down what was on the board. He hoped the guy would leave him be, but no such luck, he could see him reaching over again in his peripheral vision, but the teacher intervened in time before the guy could actually touch him again.

The guy’s name was Garret and he didn’t make any more moves to reach over after that, but that didn’t stop him from trying to get Bucky’s attention the remaining twenty minutes of the period.

In the end Bucky stormed out of the classroom thoroughly pissed and more than a little homicidal. Apparently news about the new guy traveled fast in this school and he got more than a few comments and countless stares on the way to his locker. A few people had even picked up on what was up with his arm, putting one and one together from how stiffly he held it and how he never actually used it, leaving his hand in the pocket of his hoodie.

He actually needed close to ten minutes to his locker at the other end of the school with all the students storming out of the classrooms and off into lunch break. By the time he reached it he was ready to bang his head against it, or preferably bang the head of the next person who made a dumb remark against it. That sounded like the better plan.

Bucky dropped his bag on the floor and pulled open his locker. Most students carried the books that didn’t fit in their bag in their arms from class to class to save them the trip to the locker every time, but seeing as he only had the one arm, Bucky preferred to leave the books he didn’t need in his locker and have his arm free instead.

He was just putting a book back into his bag when somebody stopped right next to his locker and cleared their throat loudly, trying to get Bucky’s attention. The guy was a few inches taller than him and the locker door did nothing to obscure his wide frame. Bucky ignored him, but was fully prepared to snap at him if he so much as opened his mouth.

“Hey, sorry I was wonderi-“

Bucky slammed the locker door shut and glared at the guy, blond hair, blue eyes and mouth open in mid-sentence, that jaw was chiseled out of marble he was sure.

“A dinosaur ripped it off.” Bucky said before he could stop himself and the guy looked even more confused.

“Ripped off what?” He genuinely sounded concerned and Bucky needed a moment to realize that he hadn’t actually asked about his arm. He then turned around and hit his head against the locker; if he hadn’t known he was romantically interested in guys already the realization would have surely hit him in this very moment. The guy was gorgeous and Bucky wanted nothing more than to melt into the locker and disappear. He’d scared off the only person who hadn’t made a dumb remark about being the new guy or his arm, his first day at this school was going fantastic so far. He left his eyes closed and waited for Tall, Blond and Handsome to disappear.

“Rough first day?” The guy asked concerned. He hadn’t left. Bucky groaned and cracked open one eye to look at him.

“Missed my first three weeks as a freshman ‘cause I was sick, I know what it’s like to see that everybody has already made friends and knows their way around the school and you sit there alone with no idea what’s going on. Must be harder for you even, can’t even pull the “I’m a freshman” card when you want to know where a classroom is.”

Bucky turned his head; still keeping it pressed against the cool locker and finally looked at the guy with both eyes open. “You’re the first good thing that happened to me today.” He confessed and the guy gave him the most radiant smile.

“Come on, let’s get to lunch, you can sit at our table and I’ll introduce you to a few people.”

Bucky nodded dumbly. If this was a trick he didn’t really care, the day could not get any worse and at least then he got to spend a few minutes with the most handsome guy in the school and that had to be worth something.

“Just let me get my last book.” Bucky quickly finished up packing his books and closed his locker again, this time more gently. He pulled the strap of his bag over his head so it rested on his left shoulder and motioned for Tall, Blond and ‘Captain of some sports team for sure’ to lead the way. He had no idea how to get to the cafeteria from where they were.

“I’m Steve by the way. Steve Rogers. You’re James, right? You’re in my English class, first period, I think you’re sitting directly behind me.”

“It’s Bucky actually and yeah, I remember you.”

Now that Steve said it, he could remember seeing him in first period, or rather he could see his back and not much else, leave alone half the board. He didn’t say that and instead focused on keeping up with Steve and his long strides and avoiding bumping into anybody.

People seemed to stare less now or maybe he imagined it. They would still look, but instead of just blatantly gawking at him they looked away once Steve caught their eye. Weird.

In the cafeteria Steve left him alone at the end of the lunch line, Bucky figured that was the end of that then and something must have shown on his face because Steve almost tripped over his words trying to apologize and saying he brought his own lunch from home and that he and his friends would just be over there waiting at the table.

Bucky shrugged not quite trusting what sounded too good to be true and watched Steve push his way through the crowd of students.

The lunch line moved fast and luckily the school had an automated system for paying so Bucky only had to put his wallet with his Student ID card on the scanner thing and it would charge his account, no fumbling with coins, at least he had that going.

Whatever they had put on his plate –mashed potatoes and some kind of meat loaf from the looks of it – proved to be too heavy to hold with one hand though so he had to pull out his other and support the tray with his prosthetic arm.

Navigating through the tables was a nightmare and he almost dropped the whole thing when somebody brushed past him, making him jerk back. The elbow of his prosthetic arm could be operated over a cable that was connected to the harness over his shoulders and Bucky had to hold the tension to keep the elbow at a ninety degree angle, evading jerks that seemed to be set on making his life hell didn’t help that in the least.

Spotting Steve was actually easier than he thought. The guy was standing, towering over everybody, waving both hands in his direction, it was adorable really and it took a load of Bucky’s mind seeing that Steve had actually told the truth. Things were looking up.

He reached the table without further trouble and sat down at the end of the table opposite of Steve. He didn’t know if Steve did it on purpose but he ended up with his left side to the aisle and was really grateful that he didn’t have a person on his bad side.

The person next to him was a girl with pale skin and wavy red hair, her green eyes were sparkling with mischief but he couldn’t really feel any malicious intend when she looked him up and down, when he took the seat beside her. Opposite of her was a black boy maybe a year younger than himself, who was stuffing food into his face like there was no tomorrow. Next to him was the very talkative white guy from third period, whom the teacher had called Anthony, if Bucky recalled that correctly. Next to him was another white girl with blonde hair in a neat pony tail, she was currently trying to keep the black guy on her other side from stabbing Anthony with a fork and Bucky really didn’t want to know what was going on. Opposite them sat two white boys. One had purple tinted sunglasses on and short blond hair that barely covered the hearing aids behind his ears. He seemed to be in an eating competition with the guy next to Steve as they were intently staring at each other as they shoveled food into their mouths. The other guy had brown curly hair and wore normal glasses; he had a book open before his plate and was absentmindedly poking at his food. The last person on the table had long blond hair that was braided in parts and they were facing the next table where a very loud discussion of some thing or another was going on and he wasn’t even sure if that person belonged to Steve’s friends.

Bucky had somehow managed to get his prosthetic hand back into his hoodie pocket without any trouble and was just about to dig into his mashed potatoes when the girl next to him jostled his elbow.

“So Bucky, huh?” She had pushed her tray away from her and had an elbow on the table, leaning her cheek on her hand. She smiled at him and Bucky swallowed. That simple question that was not even much of a question felt like an interrogation coming from her. He glanced at Steve who only smiled encouragingly at him and Bucky felt himself nod at the girl.

“Maybe you should introduce everybody, Stevie.” She drawled and Steve’s face turned bright red.

“Yes, right.” He put his sandwich down and wiped his mouth.

“This is Natasha.” Steve started, pointing at the red-head next to Bucky, then poked the guy next to himself. “This is Sam. Sam say hello.” Sam glanced up and nodded at Bucky, before swallowing his food.

“Hey man.”

Bucky nodded at him.

“Those are Tony, Pepper and Rhodey.” He pointed to the three people having a fight over a fork, somehow the utensil had ended up in Tony’s possession and Pepper had her head in her hands, while Rhodey gestured wildly at Tony.

“Clint.” Steve pointed at the boy next to Natasha, who unlike Sam didn’t stop eating to look at him.

“And that’s Bruce.” The guy with the glasses gave him a shy nod over Natasha’s shoulder.

“Back there is Thor, but he seems occupied so yeah.” Steve shrugged.

“Nice to meet you.” Bucky said, but besides Steve and Natasha nobody was actually looking at him.

“Did Steve tell you he is captain of the soccer team and the newly-risen star of the track team?” Natasha said suddenly, resting her hand on his forearm.

Bucky’s mouth fell open as he looked at Steve who ducked his head and hunched his shoulders, making himself as small as possible.

“I guess not. I’m lead dancer in the ballet by the way. Clint here is the best shot in the archery club, Bruce does wrestling, even if he doesn’t look like it and he’s also in two or three science clubs. I lost track.”

“Three.” Bruce supplied helpfully.

“Tony is the president of all of them, or at least he likes to pretend he is, but we all know Pepper is the one actually managing them.”

At that Tony actually turned to protest and Rhodey took the opportunity to snatch the fork from his hand and then proceeded to very forcefully stab it into his meatloaf.

“Hey, I needed that!” Tony exclaimed and reached for it once more, but a stern look from Pepper stopped him in his tracks.

“Let him eat now. You got your own.”

“I needed two.” Tony mumbled.

“Thor is captain of the junior varsity football team.” Bruce chimed in suddenly, he had put away his book and was looking at Bucky.

At this point Bucky was barely breathing and sat there with his eyes wide open. He looked from one person to the next slowly comprehending where he actually was.

“Oh and because Natasha neglected to mention it. I do what Steve does.” Sam suddenly said, pointing his plastic knife at Steve. “Just slower.”

Very slowly Bucky reached for his bag and got ready to leave, he couldn’t believe he got dragged into this, he was sitting at the table of the popular kids. Captain of the soccer and the track team Steve Rogers had dragged him to the popular table and introduced him to his friends. Now everything made sense, why people hadn’t stared in the hallway. Steve was the star of the school.

Bucky had to get out of there before it was too late, before Steve actually realized what kind of loser he had dragged into their midst. He didn’t even care about his food anymore, he just needed to get away. He stood up without saying a word, he was sure they were glad he realized on his own that he didn’t belong-

A hand on his left arm stopped him from getting any further and he tensed up at once. Immediately Steve let go.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to. Where are you going?”

Bucky couldn’t answer, his eyes darted everywhere but Steve and he gripped his bag tighter.

“I.. I don’t - I can’t.”

“Hey it’s alright. Natasha was just trying to mess with you.”

Bucky scowled and looked at Natasha.

“So what? It’s not true?”

“No, actually, she told the truth, but she shouldn’t have dropped that bomb on you like that. Sit down please.”

Bucky did as he was told, heart beating fast and he gripped the strap of his bag even tighter.

“Listen, I just wanted to help, because I know what it’s like to be at the receiving end of all those stares and humiliating remarks. I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable though, if you want to go, you can, I’m not mad. I just thought you could use a friend or two.”

“Or nine.” Natasha said. Bucky stared at his potatoes and didn’t say anything. They couldn’t really mean it. People like them didn’t befriend someone like him, not simply because they wanted to help, there had to be a catch, Bucky was sure of it.

Steve seemed genuine, but he couldn’t read Natasha. The others didn’t seem to care for his presence at the table so it was impossible to tell what was up with them.

He couldn’t help but feel like he was some kind of pet they had chosen to adopt because they were bored, but on the other hand not having to deal with stares and remarks when walking down the hallway because he was friends with the most popular kid in school might be nice. At least for a while.

It might be worth it.

He’d deal with the backlash and humiliation that came with getting on the popular kids’ bad side once that happened. It would happen that Bucky was sure of. They’d realize how broken he was soon enough and then throw him away.

It was only a matter of time.

He stabbed his fork into the mashed potatoes and started eating.


	2. Chapter 2

The rest of Bucky’s first day ended up being considerably less bad than the first part. At the end of lunch he found out that not only did he have English with Steve and Physics with Tony, Sam was actually in his Math class and he hadn’t even noticed, probably because he had his head ducked down most of the time.

Now Tony was talking too fast about something they did in third period today, which Bucky had not yet fully grasped the concept off and he really wanted him to stop.

“You didn’t get any of that, right?” Tony groaned. “Okay, probably not your fault, you did miss four weeks of class, which by the way, I can give you all the notes on, also Trig? You are in Sam’s class right? I took that last year, I’m already helping him out, you can have that too. No problem. I’ll give you all the things and some more.”

“Tony.” Steve interrupted him. “We have to get to class.”

“Yeah yeah whatever.” Tony grabbed his bag and walked away backwards, making hand gestures Bucky couldn’t identify. “I’ll see you around.”

Steve turned to Bucky again, who in the meantime had fished out his schedule from his bag.

“What’s your next class, I’ll walk with you.”

“History in 116.” Bucky said and felt a presence behind him.

“I’m in that class.” Natasha said way too close to his left ear and Bucky froze again. She had to stop doing that. Steve beamed that terawatt smile that lit up the whole hallway.

“Great, so you can take him there. My class is actually on the other side of the school, so yeah. I would have taken you though, don’t worry.” He assured Bucky.

Bucky watched him dash off, the sea of students parting before him as he hurried down the hallway.

Natasha set off in the opposite direction smirking back at him when he followed her.

History was much the same as the other classes, he stood in front of the class and introduced himself, Natasha was sitting the third row and smiled at him and he wasn’t sure if that was supposed to reassure him. Then the teacher actually commented on the fact that he was named after a president and he inwardly groaned. The teacher must have sensed his unease.

“You’re not the only one in this class, TJ over there is too, and if you want to be called something else, feel free to tell me and I will make a note of it.” She said softly so the whole class didn’t hear, her red lips pulled into a small smile.

“Bucky please.” He stammered. She nodded and wrote it down on her list.

“Preferred pronouns?”

“Huh?” He honestly hadn’t expected that question. “Male pronouns.” Again she nodded and made a mark on her list.

“You can sit down. “

He decided he liked the teacher, she was definitely the most considerate one so far and with her white blouse and grey pencil skirt she could easily make best-dressed too.

Natasha was smirking again. Bucky wasn’t sure if he was going to survive the year with sitting next to her and constantly feeling under surveillance, but choosing a seat further in the back behind her would probably be considered bad taste, since he just met her and was the only person he knew in this class.

He sighed and plopped in the chair next to her.

Chemistry was taught by a woman who looked way too young to be a teacher and had a British accent. She wasted no time with introductions and instead told him to sit down at the back of the class, stern but polite. The desks were actually for two students each, but everybody already had a partner, so Bucky ended up at a table alone. The teacher didn’t seem to mind that he had no partner, so he wasn’t too worried about it at the moment, but it would probably be cause for some more awkward scenes in the future, when they actually started doing experiments. Steve sat two rows in front of him and had an Asian kid as a partner, who seemed to have two doubles sitting at the table next to them. Triplets, Bucky realized after a second, he’d already assumed he had gone crazy.

Somehow he ended up next to Natasha again in French, his sixth and final period, and at this point he was just glad he knew someone in the class because Garret also took French and that guy had an eye on him the second he walked into the room.

Bucky made it home without any further incident after saying good bye to Natasha. The first thing he did was take off his prosthesis and flop down on the bed, groaning into the pillow. He was exhausted beyond belief and wanted nothing more than to sleep for a few hours, but napping was out of the question. His mother would be pissed if he didn’t start on homework and catching up right away and had nothing to show when she came home from work. So eventually just rolled off the bed, dragged his bag closer and started spreading his homework on the floor.

He started on the easier things he already knew like Trig and English, but Physics escaped him. He just had too many gaps to actually make sense of the problems and for the first time he started hoping that maybe Tony would hold true to his word and help him out, because he doubted he could figure it out on his own.

Around six his little sister Rebecca burst into the room and wrapped her arms around her neck, boldly positioning herself in his lap and declaring that food is ready. He hadn’t even known his mom and sister had come home already so lost had he been in his studies, or what would pass for studies if he had actually managed to get something in his head. He had really tried to get something done, even started studying French vocabs, but his mind had been determined to relive the entire school day over and over again and he couldn’t stop thinking about Steve and his friend and how on earth he would survive tomorrow or the rest of the year for that matter.

He decided he would start with surviving dinner, put his prosthetic arm back on and headed downstairs with his little sister trailing behind him.

 

 

The next few days were slightly more bearable than the first, mostly due to the fact that Bucky already knew where the classrooms where and he didn’t have to introduce himself all the time. People still stared and whispered but that was a given and so far nothing more had happened.

He also started to become a little bit more paranoid with every passing day that Steve waited for him outside of English class in the morning just so they could walk in together and as it turned out Steve actually cared about his grades despite being captain of a sports team and wanted to discuss their homework more often than not. How not-stereotypical. It would be disgustingly sweet if it weren’t also so damn attractive and Bucky found himself staring at Steve’s back more often than looking at the board.

On Thursday things went south before he even got to class.

Tony got to him as soon as he entered the school and shoved two huge binders into his arms, which Bucky then promptly dropped. To Bucky’s defense he was sure he would have dropped them even if he had had two working arms, because you simply don’t shove ten pounds of study notes into somebody’s arms without a warning and expect them to be able to hold onto that.

“You really can’t do much with that arm, huh?” Tony remarked bluntly, before Bucky even had time to process what just happened and why there were papers strewn around his feet.

“You should let me take a look at that, I’m sure I could come up with something better.”

“What?” Bucky stared at him dumbfounded.

“I’m Tony Stark, genius engineer and inventor.” Tony gestured to himself.

“I know who you are.”

“Yeah, but did you also get the genius part?” He did that thing with his hands again and Bucky only shook his head in disbelief. It was too early for this.

“Anywhere, there are the notes.” Tony gestured to the mess at Bucky’s feet, then turned and walked down the hallway, only to twirl around again after a few steps and gesture to Bucky’s left arm and making the ‘Call me’ gesture, before skipping away.

Bucky rolled his eyes, he had already figured that guy was strange to say the least, but he was glad he had given him the notes even if they ended up on the floor instead of his hand. He spent the next five minutes stuffing them in his bag and was almost late for first period. Steve was still waiting outside the classroom for him, worrying his bottom lip with his teeth, god that looked adorable.

“What happened? I was worried.”

“Tony ambushed me and left me to pick up the mess.” Bucky shrugged his good shoulder and slipped into the seat behind Steve. Steve turned around in his seat and raised an eyebrow at him.

“He gave me the notes for Physics and Trig but I dropped them, no big deal.” He shrugged again and Steve frowned.

“I can imagine how that went. Let me guess, he basically threw them at you? Tony can be really inconsiderate sometimes. He doesn’t like being handed things and in turn has no idea how to hand other people things.” He shook his head. “You should maybe talk to him.”

“It’s fine. I had worse things thrown at me than some binders full of paper.” Bucky pulled out his notebook and looked up. Steve was staring out of the window, jaw a hard line and brows furrowed in determination. Bucky poked him in the ribs with a pencil and Steve jumped.

“Class is starting.”

“Right.”

Bucky made it through the week. He spent lunch at the popular table like on the first day and he got to know the others a bit better. Turns out Natasha has five older brothers and her father owned a boxing ring, Tony apparently was rich but refused to go to a private school, which explained a lot but then again didn’t really explain anything. He was with Pepper and they had their third year anniversary soon. Bruce had anger management issues and had almost been expelled his freshman year, Bucky found it hard to believe when he looked at the laid back teen with the glasses.

Steve told him that he had been tiny and skinny, barely 90 pounds and that was the cause for a lot of bullying his freshman year until a growth spurt hit him middle of his sophomore year and he started working out. Bucky had demanded photographic evidence and Steve promised to show him some pictures at some point.

He really hadn’t much to offer in return, he answered their questions when they were curious but most of the times he evaded them. What school where you from, did you move here, what happened to your arm? More often than not they got a “I’d rather not talk about it.” or simply silence in return. He wasn’t ready to share anything personal with people he only just met a few days ago. He told them he had a sister and that’s about as much personal information they got out of him. Most of the time they left it alone.

Steve and Sam often wanted to invite him to some thing they did after school, going to the movies, studying or simply hanging out, but it was easy enough to come up with an excuse. Poor Becca had to be watched even if Bucky was home way before her, but they didn’t know that.

It wasn’t that Bucky didn’t want to go, he would have really liked to, especially just hanging out at Steve’s place or at Sam’s, even Natasha’s. He didn’t care too much about going out to do something in town, but somewhere private, that he could do. The problem was that his mother would never allow it and he’d rather spare himself the frustrating conversation that would cause. It was safer to just come up with excuses and hope that they would eventually stop asking. Bucky wasn’t sure if that was going to endanger operation ‘Stay on the popular kids’ good side’ but he really hadn’t much choice in the matter.

The breaking point came a week later, when Steve and Sam were excitedly chatting about the upcoming game that they had been training for and Sam casually stole one of Bucky’s fries and shoved it his mouth before asking. “Do you play any sports?”

Bucky took a moment to realize that he was spoken to then shook his head.

“Do you wanna?”

It had to be some kind of trick question, but Sam was an honest guy, that much Bucky knew, always to the points, sometimes a bit brass when it was needed.

“I’m visibly disabled, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“You don’t need your arms to run, you could go for soccer. We got a few assholes on our team and if you’re good you could kick one of them off the squad. Man, that’d be sweet.” He bumped Steve and grinned. “Imagine Namor losing his position, I’d laugh at him for days.”

“Or you could do track.” Natasha said next to Bucky and that hit a sore spot, making him flinch. He stared at his fries for a moment and before he could stop himself he said.

“I used to do track.”

“Perfect!” Sam exclaimed and clapped his hands. “In your old school?”

“In middle school.” Those fries were interesting.

Sam, Steve and now even Natasha were suddenly excited and started chatting about that possibility, while Bucky picked at his food, trying not to panic. He had loved to run back then and had been among the best on his team. But now? Doing sports in public, where he wouldn’t be able to wear his prosthesis and people would see his arm, no hoodie to hide in, on an open field where everybody was free to spectate and stare. The mere prospect was frightening and downright paralyzing to think about and they wouldn’t stop talking. They didn’t shut up and Bucky needed them to be quiet, they needed to stop talking.

“Even if I wanted to, tryouts are over.” Bucky said softly, sensing an easy excuse.

“Urgh, true.” Sam groaned. The vice around Bucky’s innards loosened a little bit and he was able to breath, but Steve lifted his hands.

“I’m sure Coulson would let him try out, not his fault he missed them, since he wasn’t even at the school at that point.”

“And if Coulson lets you try out and you do good, I bet Fury would let you try out for the soccer team as well. Sounds like a plan!” Sam was grinning at him and Natasha nudged him in the side.

“Come on, tiger.” She gave him a reassuring smile.

“I can’t.”

“Why not? If it’s because of the mentioned assholes, I can assure you the rest of the team is cool, don’t worry. And the people doing track are awesome anyway.” Sam was grinning from ear to ear.

“Yeah, I’ll talk to Coulson later before practice, I’m sure you could probably try out end of the week.” Steve was practically beaming at him. Bucky’s insides twisted in all the wrong ways and he was sure he was going to throw up pretty soon. He didn’t want to disappoint Steve, but he couldn’t do it, he just couldn’t.

“I can’t.” He glared at the other boy. “Just stop.” He almost yelled at Steve and instantly regretted it as Steve’s expression was wiped from his face and he dropped his head. The whole table became quieter all of a sudden and Bucky ducked his head and hunched his shoulders. This was it. He better pack up and leave now, before things got out of hand even further.

“Sorry man, didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.” Sam said softly.

“Yeah, sorry.” Steve said.

Bucky looked up to see their pained expressions, they really were sincere. These people continued to be nice to him and he instantly felt like an asshole for yelling at them. He wrapped his arm around his midsection holding onto his left arm, where the prosthesis connected with his stump, a habit he had tried to suppress while at school.

“Listen, even if I wanted and even if I somehow… could…. “He trailed off and sighed. “My mom wouldn’t allow it anyway, so there is no point in trying.” He shrugged with his right shoulder.

“Your mom?” Sam asked, hint of disbelief in his voice.

Bucky looked down at the rest of his lunch again, that’d most likely would go into the trash now, since he didn’t feel like eating anymore.

“I’d probably suck anyway.” He mumbled.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had no beta-reader this time, so throw the mistakes at me and I'll correct them. I'm not a native speaker. :/

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my native language, if you spot mistakes, please tell me.
> 
> This fic is marked as multichapter but as of now I don't have a real storyline for it. I have a few ideas about where I want to take this and I'll probably write more, but it might end up just being a collection of one-shots instead of a multi-chapter fic, so be prepared.


End file.
